I finally got around to taking some pictures of Graham. It wasn’t easy! Gone are the days of getting tons of great pictures of a smiling baby. I am too tired to post too much right now, but here are the pictures and a cute video.
First strawberry picking of the season.
Farm Visit (hopefully more photos to come later):
And a video from the other day of us making play doh snowmen. Hopefully YouTube will have rotated this by the time everyone tries to watch it! I give up!
Clearly it has been a busy month…. I have managed to get the living room painted and I am now working on the dining room and stairs. I will take some pictures soon of the new downstairs. We need to start shopping for new carpet soon. I would much rather have hardwoods, but not in the budget for several reasons. I have so many projects going on right now I don’t even know what to do most days!
I really want to get some good pictures for Graham, but he refuses to cooperate for photos. I may have to get Katie to take some again for me this year. Hopefully I can find some time to take him out one afternoon and get at least one good one. The biggest news around here is that Graham is potty trained! It happened very quickly and was so much easier than I expected. So my baby is really not a baby anymore. I need to work on his big boy room, but it is hard to take down all the baby stuff.
Here is Graham driving the firetruck at a friend’s birthday party.
A few Easter pictures.
This weekend we took a little walk on the Neuse River Greenway. There is an access from our neighborhood so we took a walk down there to check out the Milburnie Dam. The dam has a lot of history and is causing quite a lot of debate in Raleigh and our neighborhood. It was built in 1855 to serve a paper mill, later a gristmill and then for electricity. Currently it serves no purpose, creates a nasty little swamp around our neighborhood and dangerous currents down the river. Or so they say. For now it is still there and Graham loved it. He has asked every day to go back to the waterfall. It doesn’t sound like it will be there much longer and it will be interesting to see the transformation. I took my camera hoping for some photos, but mostly got ones of Graham’s back as he played on the edge of the water. My battery died while I was there even though I thought I had a full battery! I will have to work on getting a good picture this week. I should probably get his hair cut first! Here are a few photos.
In other news, Graham is potty trained!! He pretty much did it himself and very quickly. I bought three cloth training pants and haven’t really had to use them much. It only took wetting his real underpants, pants and chair. After that he just did it and has been doing great! It is pretty nice not having to wash so many diapers!
Our new counters are in and I will post pictures as soon as I paint the walls!
Seems like all the sudden Graham is all grown up. Over the weekend we took down the baby gates downstairs. It looks a little strange now! We left the one upstairs so when he one day moves to his big bed we can trap him upstairs. He is still in his crib however and no plans to move him just yet. Why mess up a good thing. Not looking forward to little eyes waking me up each morning. He is talking a lot, starting to pretend play more, is actually interested in crafts, pours his own drinks, picks out his plate for dinner and sometimes helps clean up. Still working on the potty thing.
In other news we are getting new counters next month! So I am of course redecorating the entire downstairs. I am having a little difficulty picking my colors since I am stuck with my dark green couch. I am leaning towards a tan/gray wall and putting red/turquoise in the kitchen. I already have some fun red accents in there. If I had a ton of money it would look awesome…. so here’s hoping it looks decent and not too tacky. If I have to look at the colors in my downstairs much longer I will go crazy. Been staring at those walls for 8 years! Next on the list is carpet for downstairs. I was a bit overwhelmed with all the carpet options. Who knew there were so many types and color carpets.
Over the weekend we got a bit more snow. I think that brings our total to about an inch, maybe 1.5 inches for the year. More than last year. We took Graham out right before nap and he lasted about 4 minutes. Right about when his hands got cold and wet from picking up the snow. Then he was over it. It is a good thing since it turned to rain and melted away while he was sleeping.
Puddles are always fun too.
I know, haven’t posted in a long time…. I realized today that I have no pictures of Graham this month so I grabbed my camera after nap to get at least one! Gone are the days of taking hundreds of pictures while he sits in a chair, plays with toys and laughs at the camera. Now the second he sees it he HAS to have it or he hides from me. Here is how most our pictures look these days.
I gave him my old point and shoot so he would have his own camera. I 
managed to distract him some today by reminding him he has his own camera. I sure wish I could get those great pictures of him playing, laughing or pretty much anything, but he stops doing whatever he is doing the second the camera comes out. I am going to try to keep my camera out more so I have it when I need it. I only get one shot before he knows it is out so I have to move fast and get it right!
Graham’s favorite thing to say these days is “silly”. Silly mommy, silly Graham, silly chair, silly train… silly just about anything. He also is very in love with himself and wants to make videos of himself doing pretty much everything (and then watching it 30 times). So I have tons of videos, but no time to post them or sort them. Maybe one day I will have a weekend to myself (hint, hint, husband) so I can catch up on things.
I have been meaning to post a picture of Graham’s cardboard house last year and this year. A lot has changed. It is still standing, but leaning a lot. The inside is falling down, has some new decorations, the window box has been gone a long time….
My favorites from today.
I have meaning to post about Christmas for awhile now…. well, since Christmas! I am too tired to write much tonight, but thought I could at the very least post a few pictures. Graham’s big gift from Santa this year was a train table! He got a ton of fun toys this year… most of which he ignores like all his other toys! I keep waiting for the day he takes off into the room and starts playing with his toys on his own. That has yet to happen. However, when we have friends over they enjoy playing with him. Of course as soon as he sees his friends playing with his toys he wants them back! I didn’t take many pictures this year, but took a few when he first started opening the gifts.
Decorating cookies!!
Just now getting around to doing my post on our beach trip. It took awhile to get through all the pictures! We went with our good friends and their son that is about Graham’s age. They had so much fun together and it was neat to see how much they had changed in the four short months since our last trip together. It has been so long since we went that I really don’t remember much about it! The weather was perfect and we had a great second row home with an ocean view. We spent most of our time on the beach or at the house while the boys (and some adults) napped, but we took a few small field trips. The boys loved the pier, especially all the fish. I spent my evenings putting together a puzzle while everyone else watched TV, slept or read a book. I posted some of my favorite pictures below for your viewing enjoyment.
In other news Graham is talking more than ever! He is putting together longer sentences and having conversations with us. His favorite thing right now is saying “very, very”. Everything is very very. Very very big tree, very very long train, etc. He also started singing the alphabet song, but every time he does it I miss it with the camcorder. It is pretty cute to hear how he says the letters and always skips the same ones. Since I spend so much time with him I get to hear him counting, reading to himself and singing songs when he thinks no one is watching. He never does anything when you ask, but when he is off on his own playing he will say things that I had no idea he knows! It is fun watching him learn new things and words. The other morning it was cold and when he was getting dressed he got goosebumps. He told me he had sand on his legs with a very concerned voice. I explained that it was goosebumps and now he gets so excited every morning to show me his goosebumps. He loves to wear “comfy” pants and hates jeans (so much for all the jeans I bought him). Loves his gloves, hats and Elmo slippers. Loves the Wiggles and dressing up like the Octopus (Elmo slippers on his hands). He is so excited about Christmas this year and loves the lights. We walk around the neighborhood looking at all the houses and he always asks to touch the lights and decorations in the yards. We have never put lights on the house, but at his request we have added some lights to the porch. He is so polite and such a good toddler. I guess he is making up for being such a difficult (to say it nicely) infant and early toddler. Just holding my breath and hoping he continues to be a good 3 year old.
Here are a few pictures from our annual trip to Virginia with Casey’s family. Every time we come home I start thinking about getting a mountain house because I love mountains so much. Maybe one day. We went up on a Saturday, but didn’t get there until late since I wanted to stop at the outlets in Mebane (needed some jeans from the Gap). Then we went a crazy back way to Virginia which seemed to take forever. We rented a little cabin on a Christmas tree farm which was a lot of fun. Graham loved seeing all the trees. We had a great time visiting with family and we even got to see a little snow on our way back home Monday morning!
Playing with Toby and Maggie
I just realized after posting these pictures that we don’t have any of Nana with Graham!! Guess we better make sure to get some next time!
Working to catch up on pictures so here are a few more of our fun fall activities.
We went to a pumpkin patch a few weeks ago and the corn maze was by far his favorite. Casey immediately picked some corn for Graham which is against the rules. Graham then spent most of his time running around picking up nasty corn from the ground and trying to eat it. At least he had fun! We did a very small section of the maze and Graham ran around most of the time. I don’t think we would have made it through the whole thing with him! He also enjoyed the big sandbox and feeding the goats.
Enjoying a Halloween Krispy Kreme Doughnut
Trip to the NC State Fair
Graham’s favorite thing at the fair was the hand washing stations.
This is Graham’s third Halloween, but the first we have gone out trick or treating. The first year we dressed him as a tiger and walked around the neighborhood, but clearly he was too young for trick or treating. We did score some play doh that year. Last year he was a chicken and we had planned on walking around to get loot, but it was cold and raining so we didn’t go out. Plus last year Graham went to bed early. So this year I was pretty excited about dressing him up and going out to trick or treating. Graham had other plans. He was not at all interested in dressing up in any type of costume. Last week he had to dress up for school so I went with something really simple and put his apron and chef hat on him. He let me dress him up to take a picture in the parking lot, but before we got to the door at school he had the whole thing off and refused to put it back on. Here he is as a chef for about 30 seconds.
Meanwhile, I was working on his frog costume for Halloween night and our Stroller Strides Halloween party. I went to a lot of stores in search of green pants, green shirt, green fleece coat in case it was cold and green and orange fleece for the hands, feet and hat. Mom and I worked on the hat, hands and feet until the last minute (not that it was super hard, but we kept putting off doing it). And then the morning of the party Graham woke up sick. He had a little fever and clearly wasn’t feeling 100% so we missed the party. By noon that day he was fine, but better safe than sorry. We tried getting Graham to try on the frog costume and were met with a lot of no’s and a lot of throwing the hat, hands and feet….. so it wasn’t looking good for dressing up. He wouldn’t wear any costume that I had for him! We needed something to wear this morning to Stroller Strides so I went up to the attic and pulled down the dress up clothes I got for him a the last consignment sale. I was holding them for when he is a little older and more interested in dressing up. He had three option all of which he said no, but finally agreed on the cowboy. After class I put his outfit on and told him he had to dress up to get the candy. That was all it took. He happily dressed up as a cowboy and enjoyed trick or treating with our friends from class. So here he is as a cowboy.
That brings us to tonight. Time to put on the frog costume. I added an extra layer under it since it is so cold here today. Getting the shirt and pants on was easy, but he wasn’t thrilled about the rest of the costume. The promise of candy helped and once we went outside he let us complete the outfit and never tried to take it off!! He had so much fun tonight. I wasn’t sure how he would do with walking up to strange and sometimes scary houses, but he did it without thinking twice. Some of the houses were pretty scary too! Everyone loved his costume and he was more than happy to hop around saying ribbit for anyone that asked! We made it around our street which is just under a mile. I did have to carry him a lot the last half and he was getting pretty tired, but didn’t want to go home. We let him pour out his loot when we got home and pick out one piece to have tonight. I had a few pieces myself….. 
Our frog.
Tree Frog!!
Candy! Excuse the disaster area behind him, also known as my kitchen.
